Monday, May 9, 2016

Sittin In The Morning Sun, I'll Be Sittin When The Evening Comes

Back when the kids were in grade school, we took one of our very infrequent spring vacations to Florida. Wingman was in charge of gassing up the car (yes, we drove) and packing his own suitcase. I was responsible for packing: clothes for three boys, a cooler with lunches and snacks for the road, activities to keep them occupied so they didn't annoy us or kill each other, getting the homework assignments that they would miss and packing school supplies, ordering tickets for theme parks and coordinate travel plans with in-laws who would be meeting us there.

Did I mention packing for myself as well?

Everything went great until we arrived and I found that I had over-packed for everyone but had forgotten a key item for me for the water parks-my own bathing suit. It was in an Orlando Jordan Marsh department store that I found a fabulous suit: a solid black one piece tank, with a low back, good bra support and a somewhat motherly yet sexy (to me at least) sheer illusion stripe at the waist.

I have used that bathing suit for the past 14 or 15 good years. Sure, the bra support got a little loose so I wasn't quite as "perky" as in the first couple of years, and the illusion stripe had a pull here and there. But it was the best bathing suit I have ever owned in my life. I didn't even care that the elastic around the butt had stretched out leaving me with droopy drawers. I developed a way of concealing it-wearing shorts and a big top; pulling off the shorts, sitting in my beach chair and then taking off the top. No one needed to know that my butt was hanging out, and if they did, I didn't care-who was I trying to impress?

Until one summer Sunday last year, when sitting at the beach with the BFF, her cabana mate introduced us/me to a really good looking guy. A guy our age who just so happened to have lost his wife to cancer the previous winter. When the BFF suggested lunch at the cabana, I froze. I couldn't get out of the chair and reverse the dressing order without this guy seeing my strange routine. I hemmed and hawed and the BFF looked at me like I had two heads-we had just discussed eating. At that point, the good looking widower ( a rarity in my world) got a phone call. He smiled, stood, got up and walked away to take the call, which the cabana mate said was probably the 40-something woman he had just begun dating.

Crap.

With that, I said to the BFF "Let's go" and without a shirt or shorts, walked up to eat. Butt flapping in the breeze, I realized for the first time that first impressions really did mean something to me. I went home and chucked the suit.

But now I am now faced with a real dilemma. There are no bathing suits in today's market that look anything like my old one. I have searched swimsuit stores, department stores, and everything on the internet. When I put in my parameters: "black mesh one piece swimsuit" I came up with this:

Not quite the respectable yet slightly sexy look I can see myself in, and this was the least revealing of the lot. So I changed it to"black one piece swimsuit mesh waist inset" and came up with:

This. Something that will probably strike fear into the heart of any man within a five mile radius.

So the search continues to replace the perfect suit. I fear it's like the Lost City of Atlantis or Unicorns...a myth that people spend their lives looking for and never find. And my biggest fear is that when the BFF asks me to join her at the beach again this summer, I will have found the only thing that is black and mesh and left in my size:

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About Me

I'm a Jersey Girl who thought I knew everything there was to know about being a widow from observing all the little old ladies at the retirement community I use to work at. What I've discovered is there's more to widowhood than black dresses and sensible shoes.